To get to Victor, Temple
navigated Ute Pass, an old wagon trail that connected the plains to the mountains. Laying in ambush were large rocks and knife-edged stones. Bumping over them might have meant losing control and plunging over the edge. A thriving mineral district
with 12,000 residents, Victor boasted three railroad lines, two trolleys, 20 doctors, six churches, 12 labor unions and 48 saloons. Assay offi ces were as commonplace as the wooden storefronts and tent cities that sprung up during the gold rush’s peak. But for a few hours, the
progress of the automobile gripped the town. “A gentleman who arrived this afternoon from Woodland Park
reported that the automobile reached Ute Park at 10:30 this morning and was having no diffi culty in overcoming the steep grades,’’ according to the Cripple Creek paper. Before long, the vehicle reached the summit of the steep grade
and pulled into one of the richest little towns in America. What happened next isn’t clear. Memories of that day almost immediately began gathering dust. More a tinkerer than a tycoon, Temple’s car never caught on
with the public and he turned to other ventures before the auto industry crept into low gear. E.J. Cable moved to Waco, where he stayed for the rest of his life. And the original Temple? The trio reportedly abandoned it in Victor. By the turn of the century, there were roughly 20 auto
manufacturers in Denver. Between 1904 and 1917, Oliver Fritchle’s company built electric cars at a factory that later became Mammoth Gardens Events Center at East Colfax Avenue and Clarkson Street. But Temple and the Cablers earned a special niche on the
bumpy road to history. Before the fi rst highways, before the birth of suburbia, before the Eisenhower Tunnel—they departed Union Station “just as the sun was climbing over the horizon.”
Clay Latimer is a Denver-based freelance writer and children’s book author.
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